Bedside
by ClockworkCoeur
Summary: Margaery finally gets away from King's Landing to visit her injured brother, Loras on Dragonstone. Departs slightly from the book canon where Margaery is never allowed to go see him. Contains major spoilers for book/season two and beyond, especially book four. M rated for use of the 'c' word and descriptions of injuries.


**It would seem that I have gotten back into writing fanfiction again! Lets see how long it last...  
This would be yet another angsty fic about Loras Tyrell, this time from Margaery's perspective. It contains huuuge spoilers for the end of book four and beyond. The rest of the spoilers are for season/book two and if you're reading this you probably know what happened to Renly anyways. Hope you like it! **

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Margaery entered the dark and fetid bedchamber on Dragonstone, tears welling in her large, doe-eyes. Quickly she crossed the stone floor on slippered feet and silently placed herself on the chair at the bedside of her dying brother.

This, this husk of a man bore no resemblance to the glowing, youthful knight that had left King's Landing mere weeks before; radiating confidence and strength. This man was broken. Besides the scars which Margaery struggled to look upon, though she would sooner kill you than admit to this weakness, Loras seemed to have aged forty years. Although he was currently asleep his entire being seemed shrunken, cowed to the events that had befallen him.

The tears threatened to spill over once again but she drove them back, what if Loras suddenly awoke and found her sobbing and insensible at his bedside? No, she would not have that. Margaery had to be his strength now, as he had so often been hers. But Seven Hells she should have been here sooner, arrived as soon as she could to care for him. To change his bandages and rub salve into the burns, to give him milk of the poppy and comfort him when he cried out. But the Bitch Queen had not permitted her to leave. Only at the intervention of The Kingslayer had she finally conceded, his gentle chiding in front of the right people gnawing away at Cersei's image enough that to forbid Margaery's leaving any longer would have been outright cruelty. Not that that was a foreign concept to the Queen Regent.

Sighing, Margaery tried her best to lay her own grievances aside and instead focus on her brother. The Maesters said that it was a miracle Loras had survived this long and the new Septon, that The Warrior and The Mother must have been watching over him very intently, if not all of The Seven and the barbarian Gods of the North too. Her Loras was strong, she knew that better than most. Margaery had watched her brother grow into a man in the space of a few short years, watched him best stronger, older, more experienced men at anything he put his hand to. Watched him fall in love and make a king. Succumb to grief and teeter on the edge of madness, seeming only just to pull himself clear of it's ravening jaws. What Margaery would never know about were the nights where it had been all he could do to breathe between the sobs wracking his body. Or when he had thrown up for hours on end, only able to picture Renly's corpse cooling in his arms.

The hardest thing for the Young Queen to reconcile was the image of her brother that she knew in her heart, and the image of the scarred creature laying before her. One of his most beautiful features; his lustrous golden-chestnut hair that had been so thick and healthy, now lay in feeble wisps across the pillows, growing from the scant patches of undamaged skin on his scalp. She had heard that his sight had also been damaged, although, that with the proper care it may return in time. The biggest concern was of course for his shoulders, upper back and thighs which had taken the brunt of the attack. The fool had removed his helmet in the rush as he led the vanguard and only the intervention of the Gods had protected his head as much as was possible. Instead the oil had pored over his back, slipping under his armour and also heating the surface. The quick actions of his men had saved him. Pulling him off his horse and to the nearest source of available water, the battle raging on around them. Margaery was broken out of her reverie buy a soft grown from the bed.

'Loras, Loras, my darling. I'm here. It's Margaery.'

'Marge... Water' came the croaky reply. She hurried to comply, standing and helping her brother drink from the goblet of cool water that was provided on the table beside his bed.

'How are you feeling?' Gods, she could have cast herself off the battlements there and then, what a stupid question.

'Like... Like I could ride into battle this very... Moment, and... take Dragonstone all over again.' Margaery wasn't sure whether this was a brave show of defiance in the face of his injuries, or a stab at humour but she found it nothing but heartbreaking. She longed to reach out and take his hand but any contact, she had been warned, with his burned skin could damage it even more. Instead she replied,

'My brave Knight of Flowers. How selfless you are.'

'Selfless?' Loras replied, attempting what might have been a snort. It was hard to tell.

'Yes, selfless.'

'This... This was no selfless act, Marge.'

'I fail to see what else it could have been.' Worry was beginning to seep into her voice, she knew. She vowed to banish it the next time she spoke.

'Don't you see? I was so sure I made it obvious...' Loras' tone was growing more hollow by the second and Margaery had no words with which to reply. 'I know... Better than to... take off my helmet in.. the midst of... battle or lead the.. vanguard myself. I could not go on there, Marge. They, they took him away from me.' A stunned silence followed these words as it dawned on Margaery that she knew exactly where this was going and why any of it had happened in the first place.

'I know what you're... Thinking. That the Lannister's didn't... Murder Renly...' He was plainly incredibly short of breath.

'That's not what I was thinking at a-'

'But they did. If he hadn't... If he hand't been forced to rebel then... None of it would have happened... Stannis wouldn't have used that cunt priestess to... slaughter him in his tent.' Loras seemed not to hear Margaery anymore, and her facial expressions of anguish where lost on his sightless eyes. 'I couldn't do it, not everyday, not there. Could not... Participate in that mummers farce any longer... Protecting them... It made me sick. You do not... You do not understand. I... I...' and with that he lost control and his chest began to hitch up and down with small, pathetic sobs. Lest any movement too great strain his cracked and blistered skin. Margaery struggled for a moment not to beginning weeping with him, whether for Renly or because her brother had attempted to take his own life in such a brutal way she was not sure. Renly had been kind and sweet, clever and just. He would have made an excellent king, the king that The Seven Kingdoms sorely needed but he had been snatched cruelly out of both of their lives and would never be a king again. Watching Loras' grief now, seeing its depth and its power to overcome him so completely she felt she hardly had any reason to weep at all for Renly Baratheon. By comparison she hardly knew the man.

'You know...' Loras managed to choke out, 'I can't remember the precise blue... Of his eyes any longer...' and it was then that Margaery understood just how wrong she'd been, her brother had not avoided madness at all, he just hadn't begun to show it yet.

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**Was it good? Did it give you feels? I hope so, feels are good... In a sort of twisted way. Anyway, review, favourite, check out my other stuff if you've got the time. Hope you enjoy the rest of your day! **


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